Flying Dutchman (ship)
The Flying Dutchman is a Dutch three-masted brigantine schooner well known in legend as a "ghost ship." According to legend, the ship is cursed to never be allowed to make port and must sail the seas forever. Sailors who see it at see eventually experience great misfortune. The ship was commanded by Captain Reuben Van de Meer who was discharged by the Maritime Court. He put out to sea and later experienced a whirlpool at sea that stranded him and the ship in the Mist Marsh of the Land of the Lost. The ship was frequently robbed by Malak stealing relics as treasure, but Van de Meer befriended the Marshalls, who helped him restore his ship and get it sailing. Once restored, Van de Meer got the ship going, making it lift off and fly off into the atmosphere over the Land of the Lost, revealing it was a ghost ship the entire time. Trivia * The Flying Dutchman is a literary creation which is believed to have some historical veracity. The story is said to be cased on the legend of Seventeenth Century Dutch Sea Captain Bernard Fokke. He was a daring and skilled mariner. Some of his voyages were so remarkable that it was rumored that he had supernatural aide. While trying to round the Cape of Good Hope from the Dutch Colony Batavia in the West Indies back to Amsterdam, his ship, "The Libera Nos," was hit by the likes of a storm never before seen. His crew begged to put into the closest harbor, but Fokke laughed at their fears and said he was afraid of nothing in heaven and hell. Shutting himself up in his cabin, he drank and smoked his pipe as the storm grew even worse. He challenged God himself to sink his ship, shouting "I WILL round this cape even if I have to keep sailing to doomsday," he is reputed to have shouted. At that point, a glowing form appeared on the deck. The crew became terrified, but Fokke showed no trace of fear or respect. He calls out to it: "Who wants a fearless passage? I don't, I'm asking nothing from you! Clear out unless you want your brains bashed out." He takes out a pistol and fires on the presence, but the pistol explodes in his hand. The presence responds: "Since it is your delight to torment sailors, you shall torment them. You will be the evil spirit of the sea. Your ship will bring misfortune to all who see it." Since then, the ghostly visage of the ship has brought doom to all who have seen her. She's been described as a glowing ship moving without winds with a skeleton as a figurehead and as having a crew of specters. Many people have seen it, such as King George III when he was a young sailor. She's been reported everywhere from the North sea to the Pacific Ocean, but these are actually other ghost ships. The true "Flying Dutchman" is bound to the Cape of Good Hope. No one is quite sure who first committed the story to paper, but she's become most famous by her literary name as "The Flying Dutchman." Her captain's name was first given as Hendrik van der Decken and later changed to Phillip Vanderdecken, but no trace of either captain has ever been recorded. Since "van der Decken" is Dutch for "on the deck," the name was likely added later. In some Dutch versions though, the captain is Capt. Falkenburgh. In Washington Irving's version of the story, he called him Captain Ramhout Van Dam. Some scholars think the legend got its start after the real Captain Bernard Focce actually vanished in a storm near the Cape of Good Hope. Category:Locations Category:Land of the Lost (1974-1976)